The Premium Residency Center (SAPRC) is a Saudi government agency that is administratively and financially independent. However, it is organizationally linked to the Council of Economic and Development Affairs. The Council of Ministers ordered its development in 2019. The Center specializes in applying the Premium Residency system and facilitating obtaining it.
The SAPRC is the only entity specialized in the organization and management of all matters concerning premium residency in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. This Center has a legal personality and financial and administrative independence under the supervision of a ministerial committee. It was established after the approval of the Council of Ministers on the Premium Residency system, in line with what His Royal Highness Prince Mohammed Bin Salman Bin Abdulaziz, Crown Prince, Deputy Prime Minister, and Minister of Defense announced in 2016 concerning Saudi Arabia’s intention to develop a system for residents similar to the American Green Card.
Role of the Premium Residency Center
The Premium Residency Center coordinates with all sectors and entities of the state to implement the Premium Residency law, facilitate the procedures of obtaining it, and offer support for applicants through its system of e-services and various departments, as well as direct communication with applicants around the world.
The Premium Residency Center received thousands of requests through its electronic platform from inside and outside the Kingdom in 2019, within the first 181 days after its development. Specialized teams from the Center studied the applications and communicated with the applicants to ensure that the conditions match and fulfill what was determined by the Premium Residency System. In the same year, the Center granted about seventy-three people of nineteen nationalities premium residency after they fulfilled its conditions. They were the first to receive it since its implementation in the Kingdom.
Saudi Arabia provides two types of premium residency: the first is of indefinite duration, and the applicant obtains it after fulfilling the statutory conditions and paying 800,000 riyals once, while the second type is for one year (renewable), and the applicant obtains it after fulfilling the statutory conditions and paying 100,000 riyals per year.
Conditions for obtaining the premium residency
In order to obtain the two types of distinguished residency, the applicants should present a valid passport. They also should be twenty-one years and older, have no criminal record, provide proof of their solvency, a health report on their health condition proving that they are free from infectious diseases, and it should not be more than six months old from the date of application, and the residency of the applicants must be legal if they are inside the Kingdom.
The Center cancels the premium residency in several cases, including: the conviction of its holder for a crime punishable by law with imprisonment for no less than sixty days or with a fine of no less than 100,000 riyals or its equivalent. Second, it is canceled if the court issues a decision or sentences the holder of the residency to be deported from the Kingdom. Third, the Center also cancels the residency if it is proven that the application for obtaining the premium residency includes incorrect information or in the case of the non-compliance of the premium residency holder with its system, implementing regulations, and other systems and instructions followed in the Kingdom. Also, the premium residency is canceled in case its holder waivers it, dies, or loses the eligibility to hold it. The above-mentioned does not prejudice the right of the supervising committee of the Center to terminate the premium residency if the public interest so requires it.
Privileges of the premium residency
Holders of the premium residency, the Saudi Green Card, are legally allowed to: leave and return to the Kingdom independently, conduct business in accordance with the foreign investment system, give their relatives visitor visas, recruit domestic workers, own residential real estate, use real estate (in Makkah al-Mukarramah and al-Madinah al-Munawwarah), own private transportation, work in the private sector facilities, move between them and use the airport corridors designated for Saudis.
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